


Too Little, Too Late

by theo_ography



Category: Young Justice (Cartoon)
Genre: Angst, Implied/Referenced Character Death, Past Relationship(s), Season 3, spitfire - mention
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-10
Updated: 2019-01-10
Packaged: 2019-10-07 15:30:50
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,154
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17368550
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/theo_ography/pseuds/theo_ography
Summary: After the mission in Markovia goes awry, Artemis decides it's time to hash things out with Dick.





	Too Little, Too Late

**Author's Note:**

> Y'all can blame @flashhwing for this one. She's like, my main source of angst these days. 
> 
> Enjoy!

It’s far too late for hotel service when Dick hears the swipe and click of a keycard in his lock, so he’s tense, but not surprised, when a familiar blonde head peeks into his room. 

“Hey.”

Dick relaxes, shifting his laptop to the side and tilting the lid down as to avoid blinding his friend with the brightness of the screen. He’d forgotten to turn the light on when he came in, used to navigating in the darkness. “Hey yourself.”

“Everyone’s finally settled in.” Artemis shuts the door behind her, dropping her key card on the TV stand as she walks by. They’d all swapped spares when they checked into the hotel. “You actually managed to find a decent place to stay for once.”

Dick rolls his eyes, though a fond smile toys at the corner of his mouth. “How’s halo girl doing?”

“Okay, so far. Conner’s talking with her right now.” Artemis sits down on the end of the bed, one foot tucked under her while the other dangles over the edge. “Figured he should. He knows what it’s like to wake up and not know what you’re doing or who you really are.”

“Fair enough.” Dick nods in remembrance. “Brion?”

“Stable. Sleeping off the shock, mostly. The good doctor managed to get him to sleep, poor kid.”

“It’s been a long day for him.”

Artemis scoffs. “It’s been a long day for all of us.”

“You’re not wrong.” Dick chuckles. He interlocks his fingers and stretches his arms over his head, shoulders cracking with a muted ‘pop’. “So, to what do I owe this pleasure?”

Artemis shrugs. There’s an odd determination in the set of her jaw, but it contrasts with the glint of hesitation in her eye. “Can’t a girl come visit her suddenly antisocial mission leader for no reason?”

Dick cocks an eyebrow. “She can. But it’s rare that she does. So, what’s up?”   


“I wanted to talk.”

“About…?”

Artemis doesn’t answer right away, instead fiddling with the corner of the duvet cover, her gaze flitting across the pattern in feigned interest. 

Dick glances back down to his laptop, purple notifications popping up one after the other in the corner of the screen. He taps the exit key quickly, shutting off the stream of messages without blinking an eye. Giving Artemis the time to collect her thoughts, he switches tabs and starts skimming over his latest case file.  

“How are you?” 

Dick pauses. He saves his spot on the page and looks up. “You came in here for small talk? We’ve been together for the past 48 hours.”

“No.” Artemis sighs in exasperation. “How  _ are  _ you?”

“Fine and dandy, Miss. Crock. Yourself?”

“Shut up.”

“What?”

“You know what I mean.” 

Dick frowns, glancing at the ceiling as if he’s mulling it over. “I really don’t.”

Artemis pulls both legs up under her, leaning one hand into the soft duvet. She fixes him with a  look he can’t help but recognize from years of having Dinah for a denmother. Seems all that time spent with the Queen family has left Artemis with more than trick arrows in her quiver. “I’m just concerned, you don’t have to be an ass.”

Dick sinks back into the mound of pillows behind him. He wasn’t expecting to get called out tonight, of all things. “I’m not  _ being  _ anything, Arty. You have nothing to be concerned about.”

“Really?” A slender blonde brow raises skeptically. “You’ve been avoiding me.”

“Again, I state, we’ve spent the last 48 hours together-”

“You refuse to join the team again, you don’t patrol with any of the Bats, yet you recruit all of us ‘old pals’ for off-the-record covert missions that none of us really know where you’re getting the intel for.” She’s ticking each example off, one finger at a time. “Roy isn’t in the game anymore, but I am, and yet the past five times you’ve needed an archer, you recruit him and not me.” 

Dick stares at the wall, refusing to give her the satisfaction of meeting her eye. “So?”

“So,” Artemis leans forward on both hands for emphasis, steely grey gaze drilling in the side of his head. “I think the only reason you asked me to come this time is because you needed a date to the ceremony and Red Arrow wasn’t going to cut it.”

“That’s very heteronormative of you, Artemis.”

She huffs, snagging a rogue throw pillow off the floor and lobbing it at his head. “If you’re going for capital ‘A’ asshole, you’ve managed it.”

Dick catches the pillow just as it smacks against his cheek. He scoffs, contemplating throwing it back at the archer, but that would just give her more ammo. “What do you want fro-”

“You miss him.”

He pauses mid-sentence, eyes widening for a fraction of a second, then clamps his still parted lips together. Deciding that observation isn’t worthy of an answer, Dick crosses his legs and settles his laptop on his knees, the glow of the screen highlighting the stern set of his jaw. He’s barely even reading the file, just feigning the flit of his gaze back and forth across the screen, eyes glazing over as he focuses on looking at anything except his friend.

“You miss him, and being around me makes that harder.” Artemis sighs, her head dropping between her shoulders in frustration. “I get it. I miss him too.”

Dick doesn’t move, full on trying to ignore her at this point. 

“Dick… C’mon.”

“What?” His tone is flat. Dry. Eerily like his father’s in a way he tries not to think about. “What, Artemis?”

“Just… Talk to me. I’m here, let’s get it out.”

“What exactly would you like me to say?” Dick shoves the computer off his lap, slamming the lid closed so hard that Artemis winces at the sound. “That I miss my best friend? Fine. I miss him. Of course I do. Didn’t think you were one for stating the obvious.”

“I’m just trying to help.”

“With what?” Dick snaps, gesturing at his own chest. “I’m fine. I’m working.”

Artemis returns his glare with her own, far from backing down. “Working  _ too much _ . The same way you did when Jason died. Or did you forget that we were all there for that?”

“Don’t-” Dick draws in a sharp breath, eyes squeezing shut at the mention of that name. “Don’t bring my brother into this.”

“Why? Because you won’t admit that you’re doing the same thing?” Her voice is as eerily calm as his had been. “You’re forgetting things, missing clues. You’re keeping shit from us, we all know it, but we’ve tried to give you space to get through all this. Now I’m not so sure that was a good idea.”

“I needed a break.”

“Dick, it’s been  _ two years _ . That’s a long break. Life goes on. It’s… it’s time to move on with it.”

Dick goes quiet again, and he can tell that Artemis thinks she’s lost him again. A long silence falls between them, Dick staring down at his hands, picking distractedly at a hangnail. 

Out of the corner of his eyes, Dick notices Artemis shift on her knees, adjusting her position as if getting ready to stand up, and he almost lets her. But he can’t help himself from asking.

“Have you?”

Artemis pauses, glancing up to find his gaze finally meeting hers again. After a moment, she sighs, settling once again on the edge of the bed. “I’m not sure yet. But I’m trying. Are you?”

“I’m… working on it.”

“Look-” Artemis scooches closer, reaching out and placing a hand on his knee. Dick doesn’t draw away at the contact, his shoulders dropping a little in defeat. “I’m not saying I’m a functioning human being again either. And I’m not shaming you for feeling this way. But I know what it’s like to lose him, and I know what it’s like to have to pick up the shards of your life after everything crashes down around you.

Dick looks down at her hand, teeth toying at his lower lip. “Yeah. I know.”

“You’re not alone in this, Dick. We all miss him too.” Artemis closes her eyes, and Dick can see the tears threatening to fall between her lashes. “But he’s gone. He’s not coming back, you don’t-... you don’t come back from…”

“I know.” When her eyes open again, Dick is watching her with an empathetic gaze he hasn’t sported in a long time. He takes her hand off his knee and squeezes it tightly. “I know. I’m sorry.”

She sighs, squeezing back and giving him a small smile. “Can we be okay again?”

Dick huffs out a short laugh, nodding. “Yeah. We’re okay. I didn’t… I’m sorry I-”

“I get it.”

They stare at each other for a long moment, just holding hands in silence until Artemis gives his one final squeeze and gets to her feet. “Okay. I should get to bed, we’ve got a long day ahead of us.”

“No kidding.” Dick smirks, leaning his elbows on his knees.

“Get some rest.”

“Yes, ma’am.”

Artemis rolls her eyes as she picks up her spare key card, but sends him a final, small smile over her shoulder as she leaves.

Dick sighs as the door clicks shut behind her, flopping back against the headboard and rubbing the heels of his palms into tired, bloodshot eyes. He glances down at his laptop again, purple notifications popping up in the corner of the screen once again, but he’s too exhausted to even bother reading them now. He curls his legs closer to his chest, propping the laptop against his thighs and opening up his media player. 

The video he pulls up is tinged blue, the screen clipped at the edges as though being viewed through a mask. He mutes the audio, eyes straining to make out details in the blur of white and grey on the screen, despite the fact that he’s watched this clip enough to know exactly what he’s looking for. The shape of the vortex shifts and warps as he skips forward every few seconds, streaks of orange breaking through the white like paint on a canvas. 

Then suddenly, the streak turns red, and a few seconds later, the vortex dissipates to nothing. Dick swallows, rewinding the video again and playing it half speed, watching as the colours flit across the screen. Milliseconds of bright, familiar, sunshine yellow disappearing and leaving only red in its place. Again, Dick rewinds, pausing it as the colours start to shift. The vortex comes down again. The world is saved.

Rewind. 

Orange. Yellow. Red.

Nothing.

Rewind. Yellow. Nothing.

Rewind.

Dick pauses it again on the still image of a yellow blur breaking through the stark white. He knows the only reason he can see it is because Barry is running slower than before, matching the speed of Kid Flash.  _ Wally _ . Watching his nephew evaporate into nothing right before his eyes. 

An all too familiar feeling of nausea settles in the pit of Dick’s stomach as he stares at the frozen image.

Wally. There and gone in a blink of an eye. 

Except this time, he wouldn’t be running back to Dick’s side with a chicken whizzie or a crunch wrap supreme. He wouldn’t be appearing out of nowhere, hanging off Dick’s shoulder and talking a mile a minute about girls or food or both. He was just gone.

Dick would forever be in a limbo of anticipation, hovering on the edge, waiting for Wally to run back to him. 

There was no body to bury. No still and lifeless form to grieve. Just an empty casket and a world of pain like he’d never known before. 

Because that tiny piece of hope that would always be waiting for Wally had sharp edges, and it lived right next to the place in his heart that was always,  _ always  _ missing him. 

Dick rewinds again. 

Orange. Yellow. Red. Nothing. 

Rewind.

Yellow. 

Nothing. 

Dick stares at the frozen image, gritting his teeth. No. Not nothing.  _ Something _ . There has to be  _ something _ . Some rhyme or reason behind this, these things can’t keep happening. He can’t keep losing people. He can’t keep going like this, one loved one after another dying as he stands by, never able to stop it.

He couldn’t save his parents. 

He couldn’t save Jason.

He stood by helplessly while his best friend saved the world, and lost him in the process.

When Dick finally closes the laptop, plunging the room into darkness and tossing it across the bed, yellow and red streaks stain the back of his eyelids. Dick couldn’t save him then. And maybe bringing someone back from the dead is impossible. But, Wally West was impossible in every sense of the word.

The last thought he has before drifting off into nightmares of ice and snow, is that maybe - just maybe - Dick can be too. 

**Author's Note:**

> You can find me on tumblr @theo-ography for all things birdflash and batfam related. Come and yell at me, it's fun!


End file.
